


This is Normal Now

by Current_Resident



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:15:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26357821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Current_Resident/pseuds/Current_Resident
Summary: The recently arrived survivors of the Hawke family have difficulty adjusting to their new life in Kirkwall.  When they have trouble sleeping, Hawke and his mother bond over having brothers that bring them no end of grief.
Relationships: Leandra Hawke & Male Hawke
Kudos: 1





	This is Normal Now

Mother was crying again. She tried to be quiet, but the Lowtown hovel was so small that when night fell and the streets emptied, Hawke could hear everything. He could hear the mice nibbling holes through the wattle and daub. Above him, he could hear Carver almost snore himself awake before settling back into a calmer dream. His brother only snored when he drank. He could hear the floorboards creak as Gamlen searched around for loose coin that he imagined wouldn’t be missed before heading out in the middle of the night. Laying on the middle bunk, strangely unable to fall asleep, Camlann Hawke could hear pain.

The dying fire in the main room let just a hint of light into the room Mother slept in. It was not and would never be her room. Every squalid inch of the place was unmistakably her brother’s. They had been nobles, once. Looking at Uncle Gamlen, Hawke couldn’t even see it if he squinted. There were no windows anywhere and little color beyond the bland wasp-nest tan that was so pervasive across the wretchedly poor areas of Kirkwall. The hovel was merely a place to sleep without being robbed. Gamlen’s gambling even made that prospect doubtful.

“Move over.”

“Cam?” Mother sniffled. “Did I wake you? I’m…”

He wouldn’t let her apologize. That apology was long overdue and it should rightly have come from Father.

“I wasn’t sleeping.” He stretched out on top of the blankets next to her.

Bethany should be here, he thought. She knew how to talk to them. He always said nothing or too much. He preferred nothing, so he kissed her hair and led with that. Mother’s hair smelled like roses and nutmeg, like always. She might live in the slums now, but she was still an Amell, still a Lady. He made certain she held onto something of that life even if it meant they ate the same awful pottage 3 meals a day.

She didn’t stop crying or fall asleep. It was going to take words. He held her, listening to the pain in the hovel for some time searching for them before he spoke again. This—all this— crying women, bad food, belligerent thug brother, stinking rodent infested shit-hole— was why he hated being awake. In the Fade, he could be in Ferelden right now reliving that last harvest festival when Lothering seemed filled with music and Enid, the baker’s daughter, finally spoke to him. Or, he could be a dragon.

“You have to stop asking him about the Estate.” He said finally. “It hurts him and then he hurts you. You used to love each other. Now, all you do is argue.”

“He should have written and told me. We’d never have come here. We shouldn’t have to live like this!” 

“There are still refugees starving before the Gallows, praying to be allowed into the city. Lirene’s shop is full of people every day who don’t even have food, let alone a safe place to sleep.”

“I believed I had a home to return to, an estate. Now, my sons are criminals when they should be lords. And Bethany…”

Mother was certainly determined to be miserable. There was no bright side bright enough to distract her from the gloom of her losses. Maybe he was making things worse. Her body shook with quiet sobs. He could just let her exhaust herself crying and pass out. It was foolish to interfere.

Hawke was a great fool.

“You are…so very lucky… to have your brother back. If he could go the space of 5 breaths without being an ass, it would be easier see. Please don’t ruin what you have pining for what you had. You can’t change what he did any more than he can change what you did.”

She heaved a ragged sigh.

“I can’t understand how he could lose our home.”

‘Home’ wasn’t a word that had a lot of meaning for Hawke. Lothering was the closest he had come to a real home and the darkspawn had wiped it from the map. Every home is transitory. No one stays in the same place forever. 

He had tried.

“To you, it’s happy memories. A title. Security. To him it’s a big empty cage where he watched his family waste away. He had to let it go. This place...Maker help him, it actually suits him. We’ll find a place that suits you, too. If not the Amell place, then another. There are so many ways to make a quick sovereign in this town for people like us. We’ll find our fortune in the Deep Roads soon enough, you’ll see.”

“He just makes me so angry and there’s not a blessed thing I can do.”

“I understand. I have a brother myself. No matter how often I leave him at the tavern, he always finds his way back here. I don’t know what else to do with him.”

She had gotten quiet and still. Hawke hoped she had fallen asleep until she sighed.

“I guess we just have to love them.”

“Okay,” he yawned. “But I’d rather be a dragon.”

So, until the sun came up, he was.


End file.
